[anti-abuse-wg] Anti-Abuse Training: Questions for the WG

In message <26f1df33-b958-bed4-f748-f82324d0bea8 at tana.it>, 
Alessandro Vesely <vesely at tana.it> wrote:

>Shouldn't there be a standard for automatically forwarding messages destined
>to abuse-c following a path similar to that of RFC 2317 delegations?  I'd love 
>if AA training encouraged such behavior.

Although delegation of abuse report handling may sound like a good idea
in theory, in practice it is a tragically bad idea.

What happens when the customer is a spammer and abuse handling is delegated
to that customer?  Google for the term "list washing".

This isn't merely a theoretical possibility.  Digital Ocean has previously
sent me multiple response emails saying quite explicitly that they had
forwarded my spam reports to their spammer customer(s).  Those customers
will then surely cease to spam *me* but will continue to spam everyone
else on the planet.  This does not create any meaningful reduction in the
global spam load.  It simply rewards those "responsible" spammers who remove
from their target lists the email addreses of the few "complainers" who
nowadays take the time to report spam.


Regards,
rfg